1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a document processing system for processing a hand written document on a sheet, and a method thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
Along with the progress in computerization of office work, documents in electronic form (referred to as “electronic document” below where appropriate) are more and more widely used. However, because quality of characters displayed by a CRT (Cathode-Ray Tube) or a LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) is not as good as that printed on paper in many aspects, people usually print the electronic documents on paper for use (“documents printed on paper” is referred to as “paper document” below where appropriate).
For example, Japanese Patent Gazette No. 3219251 (referred to as “reference 1” hereinafter) discloses a document processing device for document creation and editing, which enables a number of authors and editors to easily access and edit original electronic documents via the paper documents obtained by printing these electronic documents, and enables acquiring the original electronic documents from the paper documents and exchanging of information of the original electronic documents and the paper documents.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 10-63820 (referred to as “reference 2” hereinafter) discloses an apparatus and a method that makes original electronic documents in connection with the paper documents thereof, provides means for determining an original electronic document from the corresponding paper document and editing the original electronic document, and reflects the editing of the original electronic document on the paper document to make the original electronic document and the paper document are identical.
In Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2002-222075 (referred to as “reference 3” hereinafter), “bar code transformation means” and “first printing means” are disclosed functioning as means for assigning identifiers (ID) of documents and creating a form (paper document), a “management table” is disclosed to manage connections between identifiers (ID) of documents and electronic documents, a “printing sheet” is disclosed as means for acquiring paper ID and writing information, an “optical reading device” is disclosed as stroke-type input means, “bar-code decoding means” is disclosed as means for acquiring a paper ID from an image where a bar code is used as an identifier, and “additional edition reading processing means” is disclosed as means for interpreting a layout from an image of a manuscript with additional editing and performing appropriate processing in different regions.
In Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2002-312478 (referred to as “reference 4” hereinafter), means for assigning identifiers (ID) of documents and for creating a form (paper document) is disclosed in detail; the connection between electronic documents and identifiers (ID) on paper documents is illustrated in FIG. 15 of reference 4 with the description “search a format file data base via a document ID”, and is described in detail in paragraphs No. 0056 and No. 0057; means for acquiring a paper ID and written information is illustrated in FIG. 26, FIG. 2, and FIG. 17 as a scanner, a pen-type panel, and a pad-type panel, and stroke-type input means is also disclosed in these figures.
Further, in reference 4, a code reader 15 is illustrated in FIG. 19 as means for acquiring a paper ID, and an identifier such as a bar code is described in paragraphs No. 0034 through No. 0036; means for interpreting a layout from an image of a manuscript with additional editing and performing appropriate processing in different regions is described by successive processing steps in FIG. 15. For example, there are descriptions like “clustering writing coordinates according to format information”, “processing the clustered coordinate groups according to processing descriptions of format information (OCR, Image processing)”, “registering data obtained by OCR processing with a record database”, “saving the database obtained by Image processing to .shc and .tki files as coordinate data sequences”; and means for acquiring a paper ID and a document ID, and processing information is described in paragraphs No. 0077 and No. 0078.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2002-281179 (referred to as “reference 5” hereinafter) discloses a method in which a device having communication functions and equipped with an optical reading device is used to read a bar code including an operation identifier and an object identifier, thereby providing services for customs according to the bar code information.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2002-183520 (referred to as “reference 6” hereinafter) discloses a method involving a check box for selection of commodity and selection of processing methods and text writing regions, and enabling providing services for customs by using a bar code obtained by coding a printed matter ID, an arrangement of the check box, and position information of the text writing regions, and enabling providing services desired by users by using printed matter and copier-facsimile complexes, which are familiar to the users.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2002-215768 (referred to as “reference 7” hereinafter) relates to a technique for providing services for customs, which involves distributing to custom paper provided with codes including information of addresses for communication destination, information indicating coordinates on the paper, and information of types of the paper, and thereby enabling the custom to write on the paper with the paper held in the hands of the custom. In addition, in reference 7, an input device is disclosed that is able to read the codes provided on the paper, and transmits the address information in the codes to the communication destination. This input device transmits the obtained information to a server, the server obtains the coordinate information and media identification information in the codes, and performs appropriate operations in response to the obtained information.
In the aforesaid reference 6, the custom need to read the printed matter, on which the additional editing is written, by a copier-facsimile complex. In contrast, in reference 7, it is the input device, such as writing materials, that reads and transmits the codes including various kinds of information.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 11-96166 (referred to as “reference 8” hereinafter) discloses a document information management system that searches for and outputs document files from a database storing a number of electronic documents. Specifically, the document information management system uses a recording medium, which has a document information area for storing document information and a bar code information area for storing bar code information that is obtained by converting electric information corresponding to the document information, and a marking unit for selecting desired words from the recording medium and assigning a selection mark. Based on the selection mark and the bar code information, the document information management system searches the database and outputs the appropriate document files.
In reference 1, because editing is after all performed on the paper document, a user has to use a computer to call up the electronic document corresponding to the given paper document, and revises and edits contents of the document on the electric form document. There is not any problem in doing this work if the user is in his office. However, if the user is at his business travel destination or in a transportation facility, and even if the user desires to revise or edit documents in his spare time, usually the user cannot do that because usually the user does not carry with him an editing device able to efficiently and electrically edit documents.
For example, because a notebook personal computer has low portability due to large size and weight, and has low practical operability due to the short duration of the batteries, usually, one does not tend to carry the notebook personal computer with him in business travel. This is true also for a compact PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) which has a small display unit and an input device having poor input functions.
The apparatus or the method disclosed in reference 2 merely allows the additional editing made on a paper document to be inserted into an electronic document. For example, by simply inserting an additional image into the electronic document, the apparatus does nothing but eliminate differences between the electronic document and the paper document and create an electronic document having the same appearance as the paper document. Thus, the electronic document addressed in reference 2 is no more than a replacement of the paper document. Therefore, the created electronic document has not any practical use except being read.
For example, reference 2 allows one to read items filled out on a questionnaire, but one has to collect the questionnaires by himself, just like the conventional paper documents. This work is troublesome, and automatic collection is required.
In addition, automatic processing of additional editing is not limited to collecting questionnaires, but is usable in many applications. The technique disclosed in reference 2 cannot realize automatic processing of additional editing.
In the reference 3, the original electronic document is not connected with the additional editing, and the method disclosed in the reference 3 is neither configured to perform registration of a processing ID or other processing information, nor to edit the form itself, nor to acquire a paper ID, a document ID, or other processing information.
In reference 4, it is described that it is sufficient to make the original electronic document and patient information be connected with each other, but connection between the original electronic document and the additional editing is not addressed. In addition, the method disclosed in reference 4 is not configured to perform registration of a processing ID or other processing information, or to edit the form itself.
By the method disclosed in the reference 5, only services corresponding to the prepared bar code information can be provided, that is, the range of user's selection is quite limited.
The method disclosed in the reference 6 is capable of processing a document having a fixed format (referred to as “fixed-format document processing” below), but not capable of processing a document without a fixed format (referred to as “unfixed-format document processing” below). This is also true for the method disclosed in reference 7.
The method disclosed in the reference 8 allows direct access to an electronic document even from a paper document not in a hypertext form. This method is capable of fixed-format document processing specified beforehand, but is not capable of other processing. In addition, this method is specialized to search for document files in a database, but cannot be used for other applications.